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SBP studying new technology to stop cybercrime

Category: South Asia

Publishing Date: April 20, 2017

The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) is currently studying a new technology solution model ‘blockchain’ that is popular amongst central and commercial banks around the globe, to keep digital payment system protected against cybercrimes, according to a statement on Wednesday.

SBP Executive Director-Banking Supervision Group Inayat Hussain said central banks of Canada and India have adopted the latest technology and experimenting new things these days.

Pakistan hotline offers safe space for women harassed online

“We may adopt the system [blockchain] to facilitate trades. Banks may approach the SBP and tell them if they want to use the new technology,” he said while speaking at the 15th conference on ebanking organised by Total Communications in collaboration with Pakistan Software Houses Association (P@SHA).

He said the SBP is about to revive forums like CIOs (Chief Information Officers) to timely detect cybercrimes and related threats and address them on time.

He said the central bank has last updated payment system rules in October 2016. “Since then, we have provided permission to three entities to play their role as PSO/PSPs {Payment System Operators and Service Providers},” he said. Initially, banks were slow towards adopting new technology, but now they were doing it as per international practices, he said.

100% Internet penetration

Ministry of Information Technology and Telecom Member Syed Ali Raza Shah claimed the government would provide mobile internet services to every nook and corner by December 2018.

“There will be left not a single place without mobile broadband by the end of 2018. Pakistan will be 100% internet proof,” he said.

“The government has built infrastructure for IT and Telecom services and addressed the supply side issues nationwide. Now the private sector is needed to create demand for the services,” he said. Mobile broadband connectivity would play a critical role in boosting e-banking and e-commerce activities in the country, he said.

P@SHA President Jehan Ara said the slow pace of adoption of mobile banking services by people and reduction in the number of active mobile bank accountholders gives a sense that either there was something wrong with the product (m-wallet) or banks were not adopting the right people as their clients for the wallet.

Diebold Nixdorf Middle East and Africa Managing Director Habib Hanna said this is the era of consumerism and banks needed to think as how they can remain relevant.

Millennial may be tech savvy, but many banking customers may not be used to of new technologies. Banks should design products for both types of customers. “It {banking} is about consumers’ journey, not about financial transaction journey,” he said.

Soneri Bank Limited President & CEO Mohammad Aftab Manzoor urged bankers to understand the need of customer and use of technology accordingly, as “technology should be for customers and customers not for technology.”

This woman has been making the internet a safer place for Pakistani women

Giesecke & Devrient Head of Distributor Management MEA Currency Management Solutions Nader Kashgari said regulators and central banks at globe are neutral on modes of payment transactions; digital and conventional.

He said demand for cash has increased by up to 8.5% per annum in last 10 years (2006-2016) in developed economies. “85% financial transactions are done in cash worldwide. In our region, this is 98%,” he said.

National Bank of Pakistan’s Mudassir Khan said 90% of the digital transactions are done for paying utility bills and domestic remittances in Pakistan.